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ROBERTS BROTHERS & CO. 

1884 












tft 


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c~ z. m. 



JACKANAPES. 




V 





on.” (p. 49.) 


He caught at his own reins, and spoke very loud, — 
“Jackanapes! It won’t do. You and Lollo must go 
















BOSTON 

ROBERTS BROTHERS 
1884 

















a: 

3d’ 


“ If I might buffet for my love, or bound my horse for her favors, 

I could lay on like a butcher, and sit like a Jackanapes, never off! ” 

King Henry V., Act v. Scene 2. 


m is ® 0 

5 

Copy - 


SRmbtrattg IjJregs: 

John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 



CHAPTER I 


Last noon beheld them full of lusty life, 

Last eve in Beauty’s circle proudly gay, 

The midnight brought the signal sound of strife, 

The morn the marshalling in arms— the day 
Battle’s magnificently stern array ! 

The thunder-clouds close o’er it, which when rent 
The earth is covered thick with other clay, 

Which her own clay shall cover, heaped and pent, 

Rider and horse, — friend, foe, — in one red burial blent. 

Their praise is hymn’d by loftier harps than mine- 
Yet one would I select from that proud throng. 


To thee, to thousands, of whom each 
And one as all a ghastly gap did make 
In his own kind and kindred, whom to teach 
Forgetfulness were mercy for their sake ; 

The Archangel’s trump, not glory’s, must awake 
Those whom they thirst for. 

Byron. 



cs=: § ss2 WO Donkeys and 
the Geese lived on 
the Green, and all 
other residents of 
any social stand¬ 
ing lived in houses 
round it. The 
houses had no 
names. Every¬ 
body’s address was 
The Green,” but 
the Postman and 
the people of the 
place knew where each family lived. As to the rest 









6 


JACKANAPES. 


of the world, what has one to do with the rest of the 
world when he is safe at home on his own Goose 
Green? Moreover, if a stranger did come on any 
lawful business, he might ask his way at the shop. 

Most of the inhabitants were long-lived, early 
deaths (like that of the little Miss Jessamine) 
being exceptional; and most of the old people 
were p>roud of their age, especially the sexton, 
who would be ninety-nine come Martinmas, and 
whose father remembered a man who had carried 
arrows, as a boy, for the battle of Flodden Field. 
The Gray Goose and the big Miss Jessamine were 
the only elderly persons who kept their ages 
secret. Indeed, Miss Jessamine never mentioned 
any one’s age, or recalled the exact year in which 
anything had happened. She said that she had 
been taught that it was bad manners to do so “ in 
a mixed assembly.” 

The Gray Goose also avoided dates; but this 
was partly because her brain, though intelligent, 
was not mathematical, and computation was be¬ 
yond her. She never got farther than “ last 
Michaelmas,” “ the Michaelmas before that,” and 
“ the Michaelmas before the Michaelmas before 
that.” After this her head, which was small, be¬ 
came confused, and she said, “ Ga, ga! ” and 
changed the subject. 

But she. remembered the little Miss Jessamine, 
the Miss Jessamine with the “ conspicuous ” hair. 
Her aunt, the big Miss Jessamine, said it was her 


WORRYING TIMES. 


7 


only fault. The hair was clean, was abundant, 
was glossy ; but do what you would with it, it never 
looked quite like other people’s. And at church, 
after Saturday night’s wash, it shone like the best 
brass fender after a spring cleaning. In sjiort, it 
was conspicuous, which does not become a young 
woman, especially in church. 

Those were worrying times altogether, and the 
Green was used for strange purposes. A political 
meeting was held on it with the village Cobbler in 
the chair, and a speaker who came by stage-coach 
from the town, where they had wrecked the bak¬ 
ers’ shops, and discussed the price of bread. He 
came a second time by stage; but the people had 
heard something :about him in the mean while, and 
they did not keep him on the Green. They took 
him to the pond and tried to make him swim, 
which he could not do, and the whole affair was 
very disturbing to all quiet and peaceable fowls. 
After which another man came, and preached ser¬ 
mons on the Green, and a great many people went 
to hear him; for those were “ trying times,” and 
folk ran hither and thither for comfort. And then 
what did they do but drill the ploughboys on the 
Green, to get them ready to fight the French, and 
teach them the goose-step ! However, that came 
to an end at last; for Bony was sent to St. Helena, 
and the ploughboys were sent back to the plough. 

Everybody lived in fear of Bony in those days, 
especially the naughty children, who were kept in 


8 


JACKANAPES. 


order during the day by threats of “ Bony shall 
have you,” and who had nightmares about him in 
the dark. They thought he was an Ogre in a 
cocked hat. The Gray Goose thought he was a 
Fox, and that all the men of England were going 
out in red coats to hunt him. It was no use to 
argue the point; for she had a very small head, 
and when one idea got into it there was no room 
for another. 

Besides, the Gray Goose never saw Bony, nor 
did the children, which rather spoilt the terror of 
him, so that the Black Captain became more effec¬ 
tive as a Bogy with hardened offenders. The 
Gray Goose remembered his coming to the place 
perfectly. What he came for she did not pretend 
to know. It was all part and parcel of the war 
and bad times. He was called the Black Captain, 
partly because of himself and partly because of 
his wonderful black mare. Strange stories were 
afloat of how far and how fast that mare could go 
when her master’s hand was on her mane and 
he whispered in her ear. Indeed, some people 
thought we might reckon ourselves very lucky if 
we were not out of the frying-pan into the fire, 
and had not got a certain well-known Gentleman 
of the Road to protect us against the French. 
But that, of course, made him none the less useful 
to the Johnsons’ Nurse when the little Miss John¬ 
sons were naughty. 

“ You leave off crying this minnit, Miss Jane, or 


THE BLACK CAPTAIN. 


9 


I ’ll give you right away to that horrid wicked offi¬ 
cer. Jemima! just look out o’ the windy, if you 
please, and see if the Black Cap’n’s a-coming with 
his horse to carry away Miss Jane.” 

And there, sure enough, the Black Captain 
strode by, with his sword clattering as if it did not 
know whose head to cut off first. But he did 
not call for Miss Jane that time. He went on to 
the Green, where he came so suddenly upon the 
eldest Master Johnson, sitting in a puddle on pur¬ 
pose, in his new nankeen skeleton suit, that the 
young gentleman thought judgment had overtaken 
him at last, and abandoned himself to the howlings 
of despair. His howls were redoubled when he 
was clutched from behind and swung over the 
Black Captain’s shoulder; but in five minutes his 
tears were stanched, and he was playing with the 
officer’s accoutrements. All of which the Gray 
Goose saw with her own eyes, and heard after¬ 
wards that that bad boy had been whining to 
go back to the Black Captain ever since, which 
showed how hardened he was, and that nobody 
but Bonaparte himself could be expected to do 
him any good. 

But those were “ trying times.” It was bad 
enough when the pickle of a large and respectable 
family cried for the Black Captain; when it came 
to the little Miss Jessamine crying for him, one 
felt that the sooner the French landed and had 
done with it, the better. 


IO 


JACKANAPES. 


The big Miss Jessamine’s objection to him was 
that he was a soldier; and this prejudice was 
shared by all the Green. “ A soldier,” as the 
speaker from the town had observed, “ is a blood¬ 
thirsty, unsettled sort of a rascal, that the peace¬ 
able, home-loving, bread-winning citizen can never 
conscientiously look on as a brother till he has 
beaten his sword into a ploughshare and his spear 
into a pruning-hook.” 

On the other hand, there was some truth in what 
the Postman (an old soldier) said in reply, — that the 
sword has to cut a way for us out of many a scrape 
into which our bread-winners get us when they 
drive their ploughshares into fallows that don’t be¬ 
long to them. Indeed, whilst our most peaceful 
citizens were prosperous chiefly by means of cot¬ 
ton, of sugar, and of the rise and fall of the money- 
market (not to speak of such salable matters as 
opium, firearms, and “black ivory”), disturbances 
were apt to arise in India, Africa, and other out¬ 
landish parts, where the fathers of our domestic 
race were making fortunes for their families. And 
for that matter, even on the Green, we did not 
wish the military to leave us in the lurch, so long 
as there was any fear that the French were 
coming . 1 

1 “ The political men declare war, and generally for commercial 
interests; but when the nation is thus embroiled with its neigh¬ 
bors, the soldier . . . draws the sword at the command of his 
country. . . . One word as to thy comparison of military and com¬ 
mercial persons. What manner of men be they who have supplied 


OFF FOR GRETNA GREEN. 


II 


To let the Black Captain have little Miss Jessa¬ 
mine, however, was another matter. Her aunt 
would not hear of it; and then, to crown all, it ap¬ 
peared that the Captain’s father did not think the 



young lady good enough for his son. Never was 
any affair more clearly brought to a conclusion. 

But those were “ trying times; ” and one moon¬ 
light night, when the Gray Goose was sound asleep 

the Caffres with the fire-arms and ammunition to maintain their 
savage and deplorable wars ? Assuredly they are not military. 
. . . Cease then, if thou wouldst be counted among the just, 
to vilify soldiers.”—W. Napier, Lieutenant-General , November, 

1851. 














12 


JACKANAPES. 


upon one leg, the Green was rudely shaken under 
her by the thud of a horse’s feet. “ Ga, ga ! ” said 
she, putting down the other leg and running away. 

By the time she returned to her place not a 
thing was to be seen or heard. The horse had 
passed like a shot. But next day there was hur¬ 
rying and skurrying and cackling at a very early 
hour, all about the white house with the black 
beams, where Miss Jessamine lived. And when 
the sun was so low and the shadows so long on the 
grass that the Gray Goose felt ready to run away 
at the sight of her own neck, little Miss Jane John¬ 
son and her “ particular friend ” Clarinda sat 
under the big oak tree on the Green, and Jane 
pinched Clarinda’s little finger till she found that 
she could keep a secret, and then she told her in 
confidence that she had heard from Nurse and 
Jemima that Miss Jessamine’s niece had been a 
very naughty girl, and that that horrid wicked 
officer had come for her on his black horse and 
carried her right away. 

“ Will she never come back?” asked Clarinda. 

“Oh, no! ” said Jane, decidedly. “Bony never 
brings people back.” 

“Not never no more?” sobbed Clarinda, for she 
was weak-minded, and could not bear to think that 
Bony never, never let naughty people go home 
again. 

Next day Jane had heard more. 

“ He has taken her to a Green.” 


THE BLACK CAPTAIN GOES TO WAR. 13 

‘A Goose Green?” asked Clarinda. 

“ No. A Gretna Green. Don’t ask so many 
questions, child,” said Jane, who, having no more 
to tell, gave herself airs. 

Jane was wrong on one point. Miss Jessamine’s 
niece did come back, and she and her husband 
were forgiven. The Gray Goose remembered it 
well; it was Michaelmas-tide, the Michaelmas be¬ 
fore the Michaelmas before the Michaelmas — but, 
ga, ga! What does the date matter? It was au¬ 
tumn, harvest-time, and everybody was so busy 
prophesying and praying about the crops, that the 
young couple wandered through the lanes, and got 
blackberries for Miss Jessamine’s celebrated crab 
and blackberry jam, and made guys of themselves 
with bryony-wreaths, and not a soul troubled his 
head about them, except the children and the 
Postman. The children dogged the Black Cap¬ 
tain’s footsteps (his bubble reputation as an Ogre 
having burst) clamoring for a ride on the black 
mare. And the Postman would go somewhat out 
of his postal way to catch the Captain’s dark eye, 
and show that he had not forgotten how to salute 
an officer. 

But they were “ trying times.” One afternoon 
the black mare was stepping gently up and down 
the grass, with her head at her master’s shoulder, 
and as many children crowded on to her silky back 
as if she had been an elephant in a menagerie; 
and the next afternoon she carried him away, 


JACKANAPES. 


H 

sword and sabre-taclie clattering war music at her 
side, and the old Postman waiting for them, rigid 
with salutation, at the four cross-roads. 



War and bad times! It was a hard winter; and 
the big Miss Jessamine and the little Miss Jessa¬ 
mine (but she was Mrs. Black-Captain now) lived 











ILL NEWS RIDES POST. 


15 


very economically, that they might help their 
poorer neighbors. They neither entertained nor 
went into company; but the young lady always 
went up the village as far as the George and 
Dragon , for air and exercise, when the London 
Mail 1 came in. 

One day (it was a day in the following June) it 
came in earlier than usual, and the young lady was 
not there to meet it. 

But a crowd soon gathered round the George and 
Dragon , gaping to see the Mail Coach dressed with 
flowers and oak-leaves, and the guard wearing a 
laurel wreath over and above his royal livery. The 
ribbons that decked the horses were stained and 
flecked with the warmth and foam of the pace at 
which they had come, for they had pressed on with 
the news of Victory. 

Miss Jessamine was sitting with her niece under 
the oak-tree on the Green, when the Postman put 
a newspaper silently into her hand. Her niece 
turned quickly, — 

“ Is there news? ” 

“ Don’t agitate yourself, my dear,” said her aunt. 
“ I will read it aloud, and then we can enjoy it to- 

1 “ The Mail Coach it was that distributed over the face of the 
land, like the opening of apocalyptic vials, the heart-shaking news 
of Trafalgar, of Salamanca, of Vittoria, of Waterloo. . . . The 
grandest chapter of our experience, within the whole Mail-Coach 
service, was on those occasions when we went down from London 
with the news of Victory. Five years of life it was worth paying 
down for the privilege of an outside place.” — De Quincey. 


1 6 


JACKANAPES. 


gether; a far more comfortable method, my love, 
than when you go up the village, and come home 
out of breath, having snatched half the news as 
you run.” 

“ I am all attention, dear aunt,” said the little 
lady, clasping her hands tightly on her lap. 

Then Miss Jessamine read aloud, — she was 
proud of her reading, — and the old soldier stood 
at attention behind her, with such a blending of 
pride and pity on his face as it was strange to 
see: — 

“ Downing Street, 

June 22, 1815, 1 a . m .” 

i 

“ That’s one in the morning,” gasped the Post¬ 
man ; “ beg your pardon, mum.” 

But though he apologized, he could not refrain 
from echoing here and there a weighty word: 
“Glorious victory,” — “Two hundred pieces of 
artillery,” — “Immense quantity of ammunition,” — 
and so forth. 

“The loss of the British Army upon this occasion has 
unfortunately been most severe. It had not been possible to 
make out a return of the killed and wounded when Major 
Percy left headquarters. The names of the officers killed 
and wounded, as far as they can be collected, are annexed. 

“ I have the honor — ” 

“ The list, aunt! Read the list! ” 

“ My love — my darling — let us go in and — ” 

“No. Now! now!” 

To one thing the supremely afflicted are entitled 


FIERCE WAR AND FAITHFUL LOVE. 17 

in their sorrow, — to be obeyed ; and yet it is the 
last kindness that people commonly will do them. 
But Miss Jessamine did. Steadying her voice, as 
best she might, she read on; and the old soldier 
stood bareheaded to hear that first Roll of the 
Dead at Waterloo, which began with the Duke of 
Brunswick and ended with Ensign Brown . 1 Five- 
and-thirty British Captains fell asleep that day on 
the Bed of Honor, and the Black Captain slept 
among them. 

There are killed and wounded by war, of whom 
no returns reach Downing Street. 

Three days later, the Captain’s wife had joined 
him, and Miss Jessamine was kneeling by the 
cradle of their orphan son, a purple-red morsel of 
humanity, with conspicuously golden hair. 

“Will he live, Doctor?” 

“Live? God bless my soul, ma’am! Look at 
him ! The young Jackanapes ! ” 

1 “ Brunswick’s fated chieftain ” fell at Quatre Bras, the day 
before Waterloo; but this first (very imperfect) list, as it appeared 
in the newspapers of the day, did begin with his name and end 
with that of an Ensign Brown. 


2 


CHAPTER II. 


And he wandered away and' away 
With Nature, the dear old Nurse. 

Longfellow. 

HE Gray Goose remembered quite 
well the year that Jackanapes 
began to walk, for it was the 
year that the speckled hen 
for the first time in all her 
motherly life got out of pa¬ 
tience when she was sitting. 
She had been rather proud 
of the eggs, — they were un¬ 
usually large, — but she never 
felt quite comfortable on them ; and whether it was 
because she used to get cramp and go off the nest, 
or because the season was bad, or what, she never 
could tell; but every egg was addled but one, and 
the one that did hatch gave her more trouble than 
any chick she had ever reared. 

It was a fine, downy, bright yellow little thing, 
but it had a monstrous big nose and feet, and such 
an ungainly walk as she knew no other instance of 
in her well-bred and high-stepping family. And as 
to behavior, it was not that it was either quarrelsome 



THE YELLOW THING. 


19 


or moping, but simply unlike the rest. When the 
other chicks hopped and cheeped on the Green 
' about their mothers feet, this solitary yellow brat 
went waddling off on its own responsibility, and do 
or cluck what the speckled hen would, it went to 
play in the pond. 

It was off one day as usual, and the hen was 
fussing and fuming after it, when the Postman, go¬ 
ing to deliver a letter at Miss Jessamine’s door, 
was nearly knocked over by the good lady herself, 
who, bursting out of the house with her cap just off 
and her bonnet just not on, fell into his arms, 
crying, — 

“Baby! Baby! Jackanapes! Jackanapes!” 

If the Postman loved anything on earth, he 
loved the Captain’s yellow-haired child; so, prop¬ 
ping Miss Jessamine against her own door-post, 
he followed the direction of her trembling fingers 
and made for the Green. 

Jackanapes had had the start of the Postman by 
nearly ten minutes. The world — the round green 
world with an oak tree on it — was just becoming 
very interesting to him. He had tried, vigorously 
but ineffectually, to mount a passing pig the last 
time he was taken outwalking; but then he was 
encumbered with a nurse. Now he was his own 
master, and might, by courage and energy, become 
the master of that delightful downy, dumpy, yellow 
thing that was bobbing along over the green grass 
in front of him. Forward ! Charge ! He aimed 


20 


JACKANAPES. 


well, and grabbed it, but only to feel the delicious 
downiness and dumpiness slipping through his fin¬ 
gers as he fell upon his face. “ Quawk ! ” said the 
yellow thing, and wabbled off sideways. It was 
this oblique movement that enabled Jackanapes to 



come up with it; for it was bound for the pond, 
and therefore obliged to come back into line. He 
failed again from top-heaviness, and his prey es¬ 
caped sideways as before, and, as before, lost ground 
in getting back to the direct road to the Pond. 












THE TWO YELLOW THINGS. 


21 


And at the Pond the Postman found them both, — 
one yellow thing rocking' safely on the ripples that 
lie beyond duck-weed, and the other washing his 
draggled frock with tears because he too had tried 
to sit upon the Pond and it would n’t hold him. 


CHAPTER III. 


If studious, copie fair what time hath blurred, 
Redeem truth from his jawes : if souldier, 

Chase brave employments with a naked sword 
Throughout the world. Fool not; for all may have, 

If they dare try, a glorious life, or grave. 

In brief, acquit thee bravely : play the man. 

Look not on pleasures as they come, but go. 

Defer not the least vertue : life’s poore span 
Make not an ell, by trifling in thy woe. 

If thou do ill, the joy fades, not the pains. 

If well: the pain doth fade, the joy remains. 


George Herbert. 



OUNG Mrs. 
Johnson, who 
was a mother 
of many, hard¬ 
ly knew which 
to pity more, — 
Miss Jessamine 


for having her little ways and her antimacassars 
rumpled by a young Jackanapes, or the boy him¬ 
self for being brought up by an old maid. 

Oddly enough, she would probably have pitied 
neither, had Jackanapes been a girl. (One is so 







WHAT ARE LITTLE BOYS MADE OF? 23 

apt to think that what works smoothest, works to 
the highest ends, having no patience for the results 
of friction.) That father in God who bade the 
young men to be pure and the maidens brave, 
greatly disturbed a member of his congregation, 
who thought that the great preacher had made a 
slip of the tongue. 

“That the girls should have purity, and the 
boys courage, is what you would say, good 
father?” 

“Nature has done that,” was the reply; “I 
meant what I said.” 

In good sooth, a young maid is all the better 
for learning some robuster virtues than maiden¬ 
liness and not to move the antimacassars; and the 
robuster virtues require some fresh air and free¬ 
dom. As, on the other hand, Jackanapes (who 
had a boy’s full share of the little beast and the 
young monkey in his natural composition) was 
none the worse, at his tender years, for learning 
some maidenliness, — so far as maidenliness means 
decency, pity, unselfishness, and pretty behavior. 

And it is due to him to say that he was an 
obedient boy, and a boy whose word could be 
depended on, long before his grandfather the 
General came to live at the Green. 

He was obedient; that is, he did what his great- 
aunt told him. But—oh dear! oh dear!—the 
pranks he played, which it had never entered into 
her head to forbid ! 


24 


JACKANAPES. 


It was when he had just been put into skeletons 
(frocks never suited him) that he became very 
friendly with Master Tony Johnson, a younger 
brother of the young gentleman who sat in the 
puddle on purpose. Tony was not enterprising, 
and Jackanapes led him by the nose. One sum¬ 
mer’s evening they were out late, and Miss Jessa¬ 
mine was becoming anxious, when Jackanapes 
presented himself with a ghastly face all be¬ 
smirched with tears. He was unusually subdued. 

“ I’m afraid,” he sobbed, — “ if you please, I’m 
very much afraid that Tony Johnson’s dying in 
the churchyard.” 

Miss Jessamine was just beginning to be dis¬ 
tracted, when she smelt Jackanapes. 

“ You naughty, naughty boys! Do you mean 
to tell me that you’ve been smoking?” 

“Not pipes,” urged Jackanapes; “upon my 
honor, aunty, not pipes. Only cigars like Mr. 
Johnson’s! and only made of brown paper with 
a very, very little tobacco from the shop inside 
them.” 

Whereupon Miss Jessamine sent a servant to 
the churchyard, who found Tony Johnson lying 
on a tombstone, very sick, and having ceased to 
entertain any hopes of his own recovery. 

If it could be possible that any “ unpleasant¬ 
ness ” could arise between two such amiable neigh¬ 
bors as Miss Jessamine and Mrs. Johnson, and if 
the still more incredible paradox can be that 


A DELICATE QUESTION. 


25 


ladies may differ over a point on which they are 
agreed, that point was the admitted fact that 
Tony Johnson was “ delicate; ” and the difference 
lay chiefly in this: Mrs. Johnson said that Tony 
was delicate, — meaning that he was more finely 
strung, more sensitive, a properer subject for 
pampering and petting, than Jackanapes, and that, 
consequently, Jackanapes was to blame for lead¬ 
ing Tony into scrapes which resulted in his being 
chilled, frightened, or (most frequently) sick. But 
when Miss Jessamine said that Tony Johnson was 
delicate, she meant that he was more puling, less 
manly, and less healthily brought up than Jacka¬ 
napes, who, when they got into mischief together, 
was certainly not to blame because his friend could 
not get wet, sit a kicking donkey, ride in the 
giddy-go-round, bear the noise of a cracker, or 
smoke brown paper with impunity, as he could. 

Not that there was ever the slightest quarrel 
between the ladies. It never even came near it, 
except the day after Tony had been so very sick 
with riding Bucephalus in the giddy-go-round. 
Mrs. Johnson had explained to Miss Jessamine 
that the reason Tony was so easily upset was the 
unusual sensitiveness (as a doctor had explained 
it to her) of the nervous centres in her family — 
“Fiddlestick!” So Mrs. Johnson understood 
Miss Jessamine to say; but it appeared that she 
only said “ Treaclestick? ” which is quite another 
thing, and of which Tony was undoubtedly fond. 


26 


JACKANAPES. 


It was at the Fair that Tony was made ill by 
riding on Bucephalus. Once a year the Goose 
Green became the scene of a carnival. First of 
all, carts and caravans were rumbling up all along, 
day and night. Jackanapes could hear them as 
he lay in bed, and could hardly sleep for speculat¬ 
ing what booths and whirligigs he should find 
fairly established when he and his dog Spitfire 
went out after breakfast. As a matter of fact, he 
seldom had to wait so long for news of the Fair. 
The Postman knew the window out of which 
Jackanapes’s yellow head would come, and was 
ready with his report. 

“ Royal Theayter, Master Jackanapes, in the old 
place, but be careful o’ them seats, sir; they ’re 
rickettier than ever. Two sweets and a ginger 
beer under the oak-tree, and the Flying Boats is 
just a-coming along the road.” 

No doubt it was partly because he had already 
suffered severely in the Flying Boats that Tony 
collapsed so quickly in the giddy-go-round. He 
only mounted Bucephalus (who was spotted, and 
had no tail) because Jackanapes urged him, and 
held out the ingenious hope that the round-and- 
round feeling would very likely cure the up-and- 
down sensation. It did not, however, and Tony 
tumbled off during the first revolution. 

Jackanapes was not absolutely free from qualms; 
but having once mounted the Black Prince, he 
stuck to him as a horseman should. During the 



THE FAIR. 


27 


first round he waved his hat, and observed with 
some concern that the Black Prince had lost an ear 
since last Fair; at the second, he looked a 
little pale, but sat upright, though somewhat un¬ 
necessarily rigid; at the third round he shut his 
eyes. During the fourth his hat fell off, and 
he clasped his horse’s neck. By the fifth he had 



laid his yellow head against the Black Prince’s 
mane, and so clung anyhow till the hobby-horses 
stopped, when the proprietor assisted him to 
alight, and he sat down rather suddenly and said 
he had enjoyed it very much. 

The Gray Goose always ran away at the first 
approach of the caravans, and never came back 
to the Green till there was nothing left of the Fair 


28 


JACKANAPES. 


but footmarks and oyster-shells. Running away 
was her pet principle; the only system, she main¬ 
tained, by which you can live long and easily and 
lose nothing. If you run away when you see 
danger, you can come back when all is safe. Run 
quickly, return slowly, hold your head high, and 
gabble as loud as you can, and you ’ll preserve the 
respect of the Goose Green to a peaceful old age. 
Why should you struggle and get hurt, if you can 
lower your head and swerve, and not lose a 
feather? Why in the world should any one spoil 
the pleasure of life, or risk his skin, if he can 
help it? 

“ * What’s the use ? * 

Said the Goose.” 

Before answering which one might have to con¬ 
sider what world, which life, and whether his skin 
were a goose-skin; but the Gray Goose’s head 
would never have held all that. 

Grass soon grows over footprints, and the vil¬ 
lage children took the .oyster-shells to trim their 
gardens with; but the year after Tony rode 
Bucephalus there lingered another relic of Fair- 
time in which Jackanapes was deeply interested. 
“ The Green ” proper was originally only part of 
a straggling common, which in its turn merged 
into some wilder waste land where gypsies some¬ 
times squatted if the authorities would allow them, 
especially after the annual Fair. And it was after 
the Fair that Jackanapes, out rambling by himself, 





HOW TO STICK ON. 


29 


was knocked over by the Gypsy’s son riding the 
Gypsy s red-haired pony at breakneck pace across 
the common. 

Jackanapes got up and shook himself, none the 
worse except for being heels over head in love 
with the red-haired pony. What a rate he went 
at! How he spurned the ground with his nimble 
feet! How his red coat shone in the sunshine! 
And what bright eyes peeped out of his dark 
forelock as it was blown by the wind ! 

The Gypsy boy had had a fright, and he was 
willing enough to reward Jackanapes for not having 
been hurt, by consenting to let him have a ride. 

“ Do you mean to kill the little fine gentleman, 
and swing us all on the gibbet, you rascal ? ” 
screamed the Gypsy mother, who came up just as 
Jackanapes and the pony set off. 

“ He would get on,” replied her son. “ It ’ll not 
kill him. He ’ll fall on his yellow head, and it’s 
as tough as a cocoanut.” 

But Jackanapes did not fall. He stuck to the 
red-haired pony as he had stuck to the hobby¬ 
horse; but, oh, how different the delight of this 
wild gallop with flesh and blood ! Just as his legs 
were beginning to feel as if he did not feel them, 
the Gypsy boy cried, “ Lollo ! ” Round went the 
pony so unceremoniously that with as little cere¬ 
mony Jackanapes clung to his neck; and he did 
not properly recover himself before Lollo stopped 
with a'jerk at the place where they had started. 


30 


JACKANAPES. 


“Is his name Lollo?” asked Jackanapes, his 
hand lingering in the wiry mane. 

Yes.” 

“ What does Lollo mean? ” 

“ Red.” 

“ Is Lollo your pony? ” 

“ No. My father’s.” And the Gypsy boy led 
Lollo away. 

At the first opportunity Jackanapes stole away 
again to the common. This time he saw the 
Gypsy father, smoking a dirty pipe. 

“Lollo is your pony, isn’t he?” said Jacka¬ 
napes. 

“ Yes.” 

“ He’s a very nice one.” 

“ He’s a racer.” > 

“ You don’t want to sell him, do you? ” 

“Fifteen pounds,” said the Gypsy father; and 
Jackanapes sighed and went home again. That 
very afternoon he and Tony rode the two donkeys; 
and Tony managed to get thrown, and even Jacka¬ 
napes’s donkey kicked. But it was jolting, clumsy 
work after the elastic swiftness and the dainty 
mischief of the red-haired pony. 

A few days later, Miss Jessamine spoke very 
seriously to Jackanapes. She was a good deal 
agitated as she told him that his grandfather the 
General was coming to the Green, and that he 
must be on his very best behavior during the visit. 
If it had been feasible to leave off calling him 




THE GENERAL. 


31 


Jackanapes and to get used to his baptismal name 
of Theodore before the day after to-morrow 
(when the General was due), it would have been 
satisfactory. But Miss Jessamine feared it would 
be impossible in practice, and she had scruples 
about it on principle. It would not seem quite 
truthful, although she had always most fully in¬ 
tended that he should be called Theodore when 
he had outgrown the ridiculous appropriateness of 
his nickname. The fact was that he had not out¬ 
grown it, but he must take care to remember who 
was meant when his grandfather said Theodore. 

Indeed, for that matter he must take care all 
along. 

“ You are apt to be giddy, Jackanapes,” said 
Miss Jessamine. 

“Yes, aunt,” said Jackanapes, thinking of the 
hobby-horses. 

“ You are a good boy, Jackanapes. Thank God, 
I can tell your grandfather that. An obedient boy, 
an honorable boy, and a kind-hearted boy. But 
you are — in short, you are a Boy, Jackanapes. 
And I hope,” added Miss Jessamine, desperate 
with the results of experience, “ that the General 
knows that Boys will be Boys.” 

What mischief could be foreseen, Jackanapes 
promised to guard against. He was to keep his 
clothes and his hands clean, to look over his cate¬ 
chism, not to put sticky things in his pockets, to 
keep that hair of his smooth (“It’s the wind 


32 


JACKANAPES. 


that blows it, aunty,” said Jackanapes — “ I ’ll send 
by the coach for some bear’s-grease,” said Miss 
Jessamine, tying a knot in her pocket-handker¬ 
chief), not to burst in at the parlor door, not to 



talk at the top of his voice, not to crumple his 
Sunday frill, and to sit quite quiet during the 
sermon, to be sure to say “ sir ” to the General, to 
be careful about rubbing his shoes on the door-mat, 
and to bring his lesson-books to his aunt at once, 
that she might iron down the dogs’-ears. The 










TWO ARE COMPANY. 


33 


General arrived ; and for the first day all went well, 
except that Jackanapes’s hair was as wild as usual, 
for the hair-dresser had no bear’s-grease left. He 
began to feel more at ease with his grandfather, 
and disposed to talk confidentially with him, as he 
did with the Postman. All that the General felt, it 
would take too long to tell; but the result was the 
same. He was disposed to talk confidentially with 
Jackanapes. 

“ Mons’ous pretty place this,” he said, looking 
out of the lattice on to the Green, where the grass 
was vivid with sunset and the shadows were long 
and peaceful. 

“You should see it in Fair-week, sir,” said Jack¬ 
anapes, shaking his yellow mop, and leaning back 
in his one of the two Chippendale arm-chairs in 
which they sat. 

“ A fine time that, eh?” said the General, with a 
twinkle in his left eye (the other was glass). 

Jackanapes shook his hair once more. “ I en¬ 
joyed this last one the best of all,” he said. 
“ I’d so much money.” 

“By George, it’s not a common complaint in 
these bad times. How much had ye?” 

“ I’d two shillings. A new shilling aunty gave 
me, and elevenpence I had saved up, and a penny 
from the Postman, — sir /” added Jackanapes with 
a jerk, having forgotten it. 

“And how did ye spend it,— sir?” inquired the 
General. 


3 


34 


JACKANAPES. 


Jackanapes spread his ten fingers on the arms of 
his chair, and shut his eyes that he might count 
the more conscientiously. 

“Watch-stand for aunty, threepence. Trumpet 
for myself, twopence; that’s fivepence. Gingernuts 
for Tony, twopence, and a mug with a Grena¬ 
dier on for the Postman, fourpence; that’s eleven¬ 
pence. Shooting-gallery a penny; that’s a shilling. 
Giddy-go-round, a penny; that’s one and a penny. 
Treating Tony, one and twopence. Plying Boats 
(Tony paid for himself), a penny, one and three¬ 
pence. Shooting-gallery again, one and fourpence; 
Fat Woman a penny, one and fivepence. Giddy- 
go-round again, one and sixpence. Shooting-gal¬ 
lery, one and sevenpence. Treating Tony, and then 
he would n’t shoot, so I did, one and eightpence. 
Living Skeleton, a penny — no, Tony treated me, 
the Living Skeleton does n’t count. Skittles, a 
penny, one and ninepence. Mermaid (but when 
we got inside she was dead), a penny, one and ten- 
pence. Theatre, a penny (Priscilla Partington, or 
the Green Lane Murder. A beautiful young lady, 
sir, with pink cheeks and a real pistol); that’s one 
and elevenpence. Ginger beer, a penny, (I was so 
thirsty!) two shillings. And then the Shooting- 
gallery man gave me a turn for nothing, because, 
he said, I was a real gentleman, and spent my 
money like a man.” 

“ So you do, sir, so you do ! ” cried the General. 
“ Egad, sir, you spent it like a prince. And now 


LOLLO. 35 

I suppose you’ve not got a penny in your 
pocket? ” 

“Yes, I have,” said Jackanapes. “Two pennies. 
They are saving up.” And Jackanapes jingled 
them with his hand. 

“ You don’t want money except at Fair-times, I 
suppose?” said the General. 

Jackanapes shook his mop. 

“ If I could have as much as I want, I should 
know what to buy,” said he. 

“ And how much do you want, if you could 
get it?” 

“Wait a minute, sir, till I think what twopence 
from fifteen pounds leaves. Two from nothing 
you can’t, but borrow twelve. Two from twelve, 
ten, and carry one. Please remember ten, sir, 
when I ask you. One from nothing you can’t, 
borrow twenty. One from twenty nineteen, and 
carry one. One from fifteen, fourteen. Fourteen 
pounds nineteen and — what did I tell you to 
remember? ” 

“Ten,” said the General. 

“ Fourteen pounds nineteen shillings and ten- 
pence, then, is what I want,” said Jackanapes. 

“ God bless my soul! what for? ” 

“To buy Lollo with. Lollo means red, sir. 
The Gypsy’s red-haired pony, sir. Oh, he is beau¬ 
tiful ! You should see his coat in the sunshine! 
You should see his mane! You should see his 
tail! Such little feet, sir, and they go like light- 


36 


JACKANAPES. 


ning! Such a dear face, too, and eyes like a 
mouse! But he ’s a racer, and the Gypsy wants 
fifteen pounds for him.” 

“ If he’s a racer you could n’t ride him. Could 
you?” 

“ No—o, sir, but I can stick to him. I did the 
other day.” 

“ The dooce you did ! Well, I’m fond of riding 
myself; and if the beast is as good as you say, he 
might suit me.” 

“ You ’re too tall for Lollo, I think,” said Jacka¬ 
napes, measuring his grandfather with his eye. 

“lean double up my legs, I suppose. We’ll 
have a look at him to-morrow.” 

i 

“ Don’t you w'eigh a good deal?” asked Jacka¬ 
napes. 

“ Chiefly waistcoats,” said the General, slapping 
the breast of his military frock-coat. “ We ’ll have 
the little racer on the Green the first thing in the 
morning. Glad you mentioned it, grandson ; glad 
you mentioned it.” 

The General was as good as his word. Next 
morning the Gypsy and Lollo, Miss Jessamine, 
Jackanapes and his grandfather and his dog Spit¬ 
fire, were all gathered at one end of the Green in 
a group, which so aroused the innocent curiosity 
of Mrs. Johnson, as she saw it from one of her 
upper windows, that she and the children took 
their early promenade rather earlier than usual. 
The General talked to the Gypsy, and Jackanapes 




A RIDE FOR A RED-HAIRED PONY. 3 ? 

fondled Lollo’s mane, and did not know whether 
he should be more glad or miserable if his grand¬ 
father bought him. 

“ Jackanapes!” 

“ Yes, sir ! ” 

“ I’ve bought Lollo, but I believe you were 
right. He hardly stands high enough for me. If 
you can ride him to the other end of the Green, 
I ’ll give him to you.” 

How Jackanapes tumbled on to Lollo’s back he 
never knew. He had just gathered up the reins 
when the Gypsy father took him by the arm. 

“ If you want to make Lollo go fast, my little 
gentleman — ” 

“ / can make him go!” said Jackanapes; and 
drawing from his pocket the trumpet he had 
bought in the Fair, he blew a blast both loud and 
shrill. 

Away went Lollo, and away went Jackanapes’ 
hat. His golden hair flew out, an aureole from 
which his cheeks shone red and distended with 
trumpeting. Away went Spitfire, mad with the 
rapture of the race and the wind in his silky ears. 
Away went the geese, the cocks, the hens, and 
the whole family of Johnson. Lucy clung to her 
mamma, Jane saved Emily by the gathers of her 
gown, and Tony saved himself by a somersault. 

The Gray Goose was just returning when Jack¬ 
anapes and Lollo rode back, Spitfire panting 
behind. 


38 


JACKANAPES. 


“ Good, my little gentleman, good ! ” said the 
Gypsy. “ You were born to the saddle. You ’ve 
the flat thigh, the strong knee, the wiry back, and 
the light caressing hand; all you want is to learn 
the whisper. Come here ! ” 



“ What was that dirty fellow talking about, 
grandson?” asked the General. 

“ I can’t tell you, sir. It’s a secret.” 

They were sitting in the window again, in the 
two Chippendale arm-chairs, the General devour¬ 
ing every line of his grandson’s face, with strange 
spasms crossing his own. 

“ You must love your aunt very much, Jacka¬ 
napes? ” 

“ I do, sir,” said Jackanapes, warmly. 





ONE THAT MAKES OLD HEARTS FRESH. 39 


“ And whom do you love next best to your 
aunt ? ” 

The ties of blood were pressing very strongly 
on the General himself, and perhaps he thought 
of Lollo. But love is not bought in a day, even 
with fourteen pounds nineteen shillings and ten- 
pence. Jackanapes answered quite readily, “The 
Postman.” 

“ Why the Postman? ” 

“ He knew my father,” said Jackanapes, “ and 
he tells me about him and about his black mare. 
My father was a soldier, a brave soldier. He died 
at Waterloo. When I grow up I want to be a 
soldier too.” 

“ So you shall, my boy; so you shall.” 

“ Thank you, grandfather. Aunty does n’t want 
me to be a soldier, for fear of being killed.” 

“ Bless my life ! Would she have you get into 
aTeather-bed and stay there? Why, you might 
be killed by a thunderbolt if you were a butter- 
merchant ! ” 

“ So I might. I shall tell her so. What a 
funny fellow you are, sir! I say, do you think 
my father knew the Gypsy’s secret ? The 
Postman says he used to whisper to his black 
mare.” 

“ Your father was taught to ride, as a child, by 
one of those horsemen of the East who swoop 
and dart and wheel about a plain like swallows 
in autumn. Grandson! love me a little too. I 


40 JACKANAPES. 

can tell you more about your father than the 
Postman can.” 

“ I do love you,” said Jackanapes. “ Before 
you came I was frightened. I’d no notion you 
were so nice.” 

“ Love me always, boy, whatever I do or leave 
undone. And — God help me! — whatever you 
do or leave undone, I ’ll love you. There shall 
never be a cloud between us for a day; no, sir, 
not for an hour. We ’re imperfect enough, all of 
us — we need n’t be so bitter; and life is uncertain 
enough at its safest — we need n’t waste its oppor¬ 
tunities. God bless my soul! Here sit I, after 
a dozen battles and some of the worst climates in 
the world, and by yonder lych gate lies your 
mother, who did n’t move five miles, I suppose, 
from your aunt’s apron-strings, — dead in her 
teens; my golden-haired daughter, whom I never 
saw! ” 

Jackanapes was terribly troubled. 

“ Don’t cry, grandfather,” he pleaded, his own 
blue eyes round with tears. “ I will love you 
very much, and I will try to be very good. But 
I should like to be a soldier.” 

“You shall, my boy; you shall. You’ve more 
claims for a commission than you know of. 
Cavalry, I suppose; eh, ye young Jackanapes? 
Well, well; if you live to be an honor to your 
country, this old heart shall grow young again 
with pride for you; and if you die in the service 


A grandfather’s EMOTION. 41 

of your country — egad, sir, it can but break for 
ye! ” 

And beating the region which he said was all 
waistcoats, as if they stifled him, the old man got 
up and strode out on to the Green. 


CHAPTER IV. 


Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his 
friends. — John xv. 13. 



session of her faculties, such as they were. She 
lived slowly and carefully, and she lived long. So 
did Miss Jessamine; but the General was dead. 


He had lived on the Green for many years, dur¬ 
ing which he and the Postman saluted each other 











COMMISSIONS FOR TWO. 


43 


with a punctiliousness that it almost drilled one to 
witness^ He would have completely spoiled Jack¬ 
anapes if Miss Jessamine’s conscience would have 
let him; otherwise he somewhat dragooned his 
neighbors, and was as positive about parish mat¬ 
ters as a ratepayer about the army. A stormy- 
tempered, tender-hearted soldier, irritable with the 
suffering of wounds of which he never spoke, 
whom all the village followed to his grave with 
tears. 

The General’s death was a great shock to Miss 
Jessamine, and her nephew stayed with her for 
some little time after the funeral. Then he was 
obliged to join his regiment, which was ordered 
abroad. 

One effect of the conquest which the General 
had gained over the affections of the village was 
a considerable abatement of the popular preju¬ 
dice against “ the military.” Indeed, the village 
was now somewhat importantly represented, in 
the army. There was the General himself, and the 
Postman, and the Black Captain’s tablet in the 
church, and Jackanapes, and Tony Johnson, and a 
Trumpeter. 

Tony Johnson had no more natural taste for 
fighting than for riding, but he was as devoted as 
ever to Jackanapes. And that was how it came 
about that Mr. Johnson bought him a commission 
in the same cavalry regiment that the General’s 
grandson (whose commission had been given him 


44 


JACKANAPES. 


by the Iron Duke) was in; and that he was quite 
content to be the butt of the mess where Jack¬ 
anapes was the hero; and that when Jackanapes 
wrote home to Miss Jessamine, Tony wrote with 
the same purpose to his mother, — namely, to 
demand her congratulations that they were on 
active service at last, and were ordered to the 
front And he added a postscript, to the effect 
that she could have no idea how popular Jack¬ 
anapes was, nor how splendidly he rode the won¬ 
derful red charger which he had named after his 
old friend Lollo. 

“ Sound Retire ! ” 

A Boy Trumpeter, grave with the weight of 
responsibilities and accoutrements beyond his 
years, and stained so that his own mother would 
not have known him, with the sweat and dust of 
battle, did as he was bid; and then, pushing his 
trumpet pettishly aside, adjusted his weary legs for 
the hundredth time to the horse which was a world 
too big for him, and muttering, “ ’T ain ’t a pretty 
tune,” tried to see something of this his first en¬ 
gagement before it came to an end. 

Being literally in the thick of it, he could hardly 
have.seen less or known less of what happened in 
that particular skirmish if he had been at home in 
England. For many good reasons, — including dust 
and smoke, and that what attention he dared dis¬ 
tract from his commanding officer was pretty well 


THE BOY TRUMPETER. 


45 


absorbed by keeping his hard-mouthed troop-horse 
in hand, under pain of execration by his neighbors 
in the melee. By and by, when the newspapers 
came out, if he could get a look at one before it 
was thumbed to bits, he would learn that the 
enemy had appeared from ambush in overwhelm¬ 



ing numbers, and that orders had been given to 
fall back, which was done slowly and in good order, 
the men fighting as they retired. 

Born and bred on the Goose Green, the young¬ 
est of Mr. Johnson’s gardener’s numerous off¬ 
spring, the boy had given his family “ no peace ” 
till they let him “go for a soldier” with Master 




46 


JACKANAPES. 


Tony and Master Jackanapes. They consented at 
last, with more tears than they shed when an elder 
son was sent to jail for poaching; and the boy was 
perfectly happy in his life, and full of esprit de 
corps. It was this which had been wounded by 
having to sound retreat for “ the young gentle¬ 
men’s regiment,” the first time he served with it 
before the enemy; and he was also harassed by 
having completely lost sight of Master Tony. 
There had been some hard fighting before the 
backward movement began, and he had caught 
sight of him once, but not since. On the other 
hand, all the pulses of his village pride had been 
stirred by one or two visions of Master Jackanapes 
whirling about on his wonderful horse. He had 
been easy to distinguish, since an eccentric blow 
had bared his head without hurting it; for his 
close golden mop of hair gleamed in the hot sun¬ 
shine as brightly as the steel of the sword flash¬ 
ing round it. 

Of the missiles that fell pretty thickly, the Boy 
Trumpeter did not take much notice. First, one 
can’t attend to everything, and his hands were full; 
secondly, one gets used to anything; thirdly, 
experience soon teaches one, in spite of proverbs, 
how very few bullets find their billet. Far more 
unnerving is the mere suspicion of fear or even of 
anxiety in the human mass around you. The Boy 
was beginning to wonder if there were any dark 
reason for the increasing pressure, and whether 


tony's luck. 


47 


they would be allowed to move back more quickly, 
when the smoke in front lifted for a moment, and 
he could see the plain, and the enemy’s line some 
two hundred yards away. And across the plain 
between them, he saw Master Jackanapes galloping 
alone at the top of Lollo’s speed, their faces to the 
enemy, his golden head at Lollo’s ear. 

But at this moment noise and smoke seemed to 
burst out on every side; the officer shouted to him 
to sound Retire! and between trumpeting and 
bumping about on his horse, he saw and heard no 
more of the incidents of his first battle. 

Tony Johnson was always unlucky with horses, 
from the days of the giddy-go-round onwards. 
On this day — of all days in the year — his own 
horse was on the sick list, and he had to ride an 
inferior, ill-conditioned beast, and fell off that, at 
the very moment when it was a matter of life or 
death to be able to ride away. The horse fell on 
him, but struggled up again, and Tony managed 
to keep hold of it. It was in trying to remount 
that he discovered, by helplessness and anguish, 
that one of his legs was crushed and broken, and that 
no feat of which he was master would get him 
into the saddle. Not able even to stand alone, 
awkwardly, agonizingly, unable to mount his res¬ 
tive horse, his life was yet so strong within him! 
And on one side of him rolled the dust and 
smoke-cloud of his advancing foes, and on the 
other, that which covered his retreating friends. 


48 


JACKANAPES. 


He turned one piteous gaze after them, with a 
bitter twinge, not of reproach, but of loneliness; 
and then, dragging himself up by the side of 
his horse, he turned the other way and drew out 
his pistol, and waited for the end. Whether he 
waited seconds or minutes he never knew, before 
some one gripped him by the arm. 

“ Jackanapes! God bless yoii! It’s my left 
leg. If you could get me on — ” 

It was like Tony’s luck that his pistol went off 
at his horse’s tail, and made it plunge; but Jack¬ 
anapes threw him across the saddle. 

“ Hold on anyhow, and stick your spur in. I ’ll 
lead him. Keep your head down ; they ’re firing 
high.” 

And Jackanapes laid his head down — to Lollo’s 
ear. 

It was when they were fairly off, that a sudden 
upspringing of the enemy in all directions had 
made it necessary to change the gradual retire¬ 
ment of our force into as rapid a retreat as possi¬ 
ble. And when Jackanapes became aware of this, 
and felt the lagging and swerving of Tony’s horse, 
he began to wish he had thrown his friend across 
his own saddle and left their lives to Lollo. 

When Tony became aware of it, several things 
came into his head: i. That the dangers of their 
ride for life were now more than doubled; 2. That 
if Jackanapes and Lollo were not burdened with 
him they would undoubtedly escape; 3. That 


A RIDE FOR LIFE. 


49 


Jackanapes’ life was infinitely valuable, and his — 
Tony’s — was not; 4. That this, if he could seize 
it, was the supremest of all the moments in 
which he had tried to assume the virtues which 
Jackanapes had by nature; and that if he could 
be courageous and unselfish now — 

He caught at his own reins and spoke very 
loud, — 

“ Jackanapesl It won’t do. You and Lollo 
must go on. Tell the fellows I gave you back to 
them with all my heart. Jackanapes, if you love 
me, leave me ! ” 

There was a daffodil light over the evening sky 
in front of them, and it shone strangely on Jacka¬ 
napes’ hair and face. He turned with an odd look 
in his eyes that a vainer man than Tony Johnson 
might have taken for brotherly pride. Then he 
shook his mop, and laughed at him. 

“Leave you? To save my skin? No, Tony, 
not to save my soul! ” 


4 


CHAPTER V. 


Mr. Valiant summoned. His Will. His last Words. 

Then said he, “ I am going to my Father’s. . . . My Sword I give to 
him that shall succeed me in my Pilgrimage, and my Courage and Skill 
to him that can get it.” . . . And as he went down deeper, lie said, 
“ Grave, where is thy Victory ? ” 

So he passed over, and all the Trumpets sounded for him on the other 
side. 

Bunyan : Pilgrim's Progress. 


OMING out of a 
hospital tent, at 
headquarters, the 
surgeon cannoned 
against, and re¬ 
bounded from, 
another officer,— 
a sallow man, not 
young, with a 
face worn more 
by ungentle ex¬ 
periences than by 
age, with weary 
eyes that kept their own counsel, iron-gray hair, 
and a mustache that was as if a raven had laid 
its wing across his lips and sealed them. 
“Well?” 

“ Beg pardon, Major. Did n’t see you. Oh, 













THE RESULT OF THAT RIDE. 5 I 

compound fracture and bruises. But it’s all right; 
he ’ll pull through.” 

“Thank God.” 

It was probably an involuntary expression; for 
prayer and praise were not much in the Major’s 
line, as a jerk of the surgeon’s head would have 
betrayed to an observer. He was a bright little 
man, with his feelings showing all over him, but 
with gallantry and contempt of death enough for 
both sides of his profession; who took a cool 
head, a white handkerchief, and a case of instru¬ 
ments, where other men went hot-blooded with 
weapons, and who was the biggest gossip, male or 
female, of the regiment. Not even the Major’s 
taciturnity daunted him. 

“ Did n’t think he’d as much pluck about him 
as he has. He ’ll do all right if he does n’t fret 
himself into a fever about poor Jackanapes.” 

“ Whom are you talking about? ” asked the 
Major, hoarsely. 

“ Young Johnson. He —” 

“ What about Jackanapes? ” 

“Don’t you know? Sad business. Rode back 
for Johnson, and brought him in; but, monstrous 
ill-luck, hit as they rode. Left lung — ” 

“ Will he recover? ” 

“No. Sad business. What a frame — what 
limbs — what health — and what good looks! 
Finest young fellow — ” 

“Where is he?” 


52 


JACKANAPES. 


“ In his own tent,” said the surgeon, sadly. 

The Major wheeled and left him. 

“ Can I do anything else for you ? ” 

“Nothing, thank you. Except— Major! I 
wish I could get you to appreciate Johnson.” 

“This is not an easy moment, Jackanapes.” 

“Let me tell you, sir — he never will — that if 
he could have driven me from him, he would be 
lying yonder at this moment, and I should be safe 
and sound.” 

The Major laid his hand over his mouth, as if to 
keep back a wish he would have been ashamed 
to utter. 

“I’ve known old Tony from a child. He’s a 
fool on impulse, a good man and a gentleman in 
principle. And he acts on principle, which it’s 
not every— Some water, please! Thank you, 
sir. It’s very hot, and yet one’s feet get uncom¬ 
monly cold. Oh, thank you, thank you. He ’s no 
fire-eater, but he has a trained conscience and a 
tender heart, and he ’ll do his duty when a braver 
and more selfish man might fail you. But he 
wants encouragement; and when I’m gone — ” 

“ He shall have encouragement. You have my 
word for it. Can I do nothing else?” 

“Yes, Major. A favor.” 

“ Thank you, Jackanapes.” 

“ Be Lollo’s master, and love him as well as you 
can. He’s used to it.” 


HIS LAST WORDS. 


53 


“ Would n’t you rather Johnson had him? ” 

The blue eyes twinkled in spite of mortal pain. 

“Tony rides on principle, Major. His legs are 
bolsters, and will be to the end of the chapter. 
I could n’t insult dear Lollo; but if you don’t 
care — ” 

“While I live — which will be longer than I de¬ 
sire or deserve — Lollo shall want nothing but — 
you. I have too little tenderness for— My dear 
boy, you ’re faint. Can you spare me for a 
moment? ” 

“ No, stay — Major! ” 

“What? What?” 

“ My head drifts so — if you wouldn’t mind.” 

“ Yes ! Yes ! ” 

“ Say a prayer by me. Out loud, please; I am 
getting deaf.” 

“ My dearest Jackanapes — my dear boy — ” 

“ One of the Church Prayers — Parade Service, 
you know — ” 

“ I see. But the fact is — God forgive me, 
Jackanapes ! —I’m a very different sort of fellow 
to some of you youngsters. Look here, let me 
fetch — ” 

But Jackanapes’ hand was in his, and it would 
not let go. 

There was a brief and bitter silence. 

“ Ton my soul, I can only remember the little 
one at the end.” 

“ Please,” whispered Jackanapes. 


54 


JACKANAPES. 


Pressed by the conviction that what little he 
could do it was his duty to do, the Major, kneel¬ 
ing, bared his head, and spoke loudly, clearly, and 
very reverently, — 

“ The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ — ” 
Jackanapes moved his left hand to his right one, 
which still held the Major’s — 

“ The love of God — ” 

And with that — Jackanapes died. 


CHAPTER VI. 



Und so ist der blaue Himmel grosser als jedes 
Gewolk darin, und dauerhafter dazu. 

Jean Paul Richter. 


ACKANAPES’ death was sad 
news for the Goose Green, a 
sorrow j'ust qualified by honor¬ 
able pride in his gallantry and 
devotion. Only the Cobbler 
dissented ; but that was his way. 
He said he saw nothing in it/ but 
foolhardiness and vainglory. They might both 
have been killed, as easy as not; and then where 
would ye have been? A man’s life was a man’s 
life, and one life was as good as another. No one 
would catch him throwing his away. And, for 
that matter, Mrs. Johnson could spare a child a 
great deal better than Miss Jessamine. 

But the parson preached Jackanapes’ funeral 
sermon on the text, “ Whosoever will save his life 
shall lose it, and whosoever will lose his life for 
my sake shall find it;” and all the village went 
and wept to hear him. 







56 


JACKANAPES. 


Nor did Miss Jessamine see her loss from the 
Cobbler’s point of view. On the contrary, Mrs. 
Johnson said she never to her dying day should 
forget how, when she went to condole with her, the 
old lady came forward, with gentlewomanly self- 



control, and kissed her, and thanked God that her 
dear nephew’s effort had been blessed with success, 
and that this sad war had made no gap in her 
friend’s large and happy home-circle. 

“ But she’s a noble, unselfish woman,” sobbed 
Mrs. Johnson, “and she taught Jackanapes to be 
the same; and that’s how it is that my Tony has 
been spared to me. And it must be sheer good¬ 
ness in Miss Jessamine, for what can she know of 
a mother’s feelings? And I’m sure most people 






LOLLO THE FIRST. 


57 


seem to think that if you ’ve a large family you 
don’t know one from another any more than they 
do, and that a lot of children are like a lot of store 
apples, — if one’s taken it won’t be missed.” 

Lollo — the first Lollo, the Gypsy’s Lollo — very 
aged, draws Miss Jessamine’s bath-chair slowly up 
and down the Goose Green in the sunshine. 

The Ex-postman walks beside him, which Lollo 
tolerates to the level of his shoulder. If the Post¬ 
man advances any nearer to his head, Lollo quick¬ 
ens his pace; and were the Postman to persist in 
the injudicious attempt, there is, as Miss Jessamine 
says, no knowing what might happen. 

In the opinion of the Goose Green, Miss Jessa¬ 
mine has borne her troubles “ wonderfully.” In¬ 
deed, to-day, some of the less delicate and less 
intimate of those who see everything from the 
upper windows say (well, behind her back) that 
“ the old lady seems quite lively with her military 
beaux again.” 

The meaning of this is, that Captain Johnson is 
leaning over one side of her chair, while by the 
other bends a brother officer who is staying with 
him, and who has manifested an extraordinary 
interest in Lollo. He bends lower and lower, and 
Miss Jessamine calls to the Postman to request 
Lollo to be kind enough to stop, while she is 
fumbling for something which always hangs by her 
side, and has got entangled with her spectacles. 

It is a twopenny trumpet, bought years ago in 


58 


JACKANAPES. 


the village fair; and over it she and Captain John¬ 
son tell, as best they can, between them, the story 
of Jackanapes’ ride across the Goose Green; and 
how he won Lollo — the Gypsy’s Lollo — the racer 
Lollo — dear Lollo — faithful Lollo — Lollo the 



never vanquished — Lollo the tender servant of his 
old mistress. And Lollo’s ears twitch at every 
mention of his name. 

Their h.earer does not speak, but he never -moves 
his eyes from the trumpet; and when the tale is told, 
he lifts Miss Jessamine’s hand and presses his heavy 
black mustache in silence to her trembling fingers. 










DAS SICHTBARE 1ST ZEITLICH. 


59 


The sun, setting gently to his rest, embroiders 
the sombre foliage of the oak-tree with threads of 
gold. The Gray Goose is sensible of an atmos¬ 
phere of repose, and puts up one leg for the night. 
The grass glows with a more vivid green, and, in 
answer to a ringing call from Tony, his sisters, 
fluttering over the daisies in pale-hued muslins, 
come out of their ever-open door, like pretty 
pigeons from a dovecote. 

And if the good gossips’ eyes do not deceive 
them, all the Miss Johnsons and both the officers 
go wandering off into the lanes, where bryony 
wreaths still twine about the brambles. 

A sorrowful story, and ending badly? 

Nay, Jackanapes, for the End is not yet. 

A life wasted that might have been useful? 

Men who have died for men, in all ages, forgive 
the thought! 

There is a heritage of heroic example and noble 
obligation, not reckoned in the Wealth of Nations, 
but essential to a nation’s life; the contempt of 
which, in any people, may, not slowly, mean even 
its commercial fall. 

Very sweet are the uses of prosperity, the har¬ 
vests of peace and progress, the fostering sunshine 
of health and happiness, and length of days in the 
land. 

But there be things — oh, sons of what has de¬ 
served the name of Great Britain, forget it not! — 


6 o 


JACKANAPES. 


“the good of” which and “the use of” which are 
beyond all calculation of worldly goods and earthly 
uses: things such as Love, and Honor, and the 
Soul of Man, which cannot be bought with a price, 
and which do not die with death. And they who 
would fain live happily ever after should not leave 
these things out of the lessons of their lives. 


University Press : John Wilson & Son, Cambridge. 



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A STORY OF THE PLAINS. 

By Mrs. Ewing. Price, $1.00. 


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